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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29460903">Transgender Dysmorphia Blues</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/trepidatingboarfetus/pseuds/trepidatingboarfetus'>trepidatingboarfetus</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Grand Theft Auto Series (Video Games), Grand Theft Auto V</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst and Fluff and Smut, Birthday Present To Myself And The Fandom, Body Dysphoria, Genderfluid Character, Identity Issues, M/M, Michael's Going To Heal That Shit, Multi, ONE OLD WORD THAT'S NOT A GOOD WORD, Other, Transgender, Valentine's Day Fluff, body image issues</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-15 20:07:16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,946</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29460903</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/trepidatingboarfetus/pseuds/trepidatingboarfetus</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>We can't choose how we're made.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Michael De Santa/Trevor Philips, Michael/Trisha/Trevor</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>17</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Transgender Dysmorphia Blues</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Uh, so this was supposed to be up on my birthday (Valentine's Day as a gift to myself and the fandom), but as usual, life in my house kept getting in the way, and everyone else is always more important, so it's late, but better late than never, I guess? </p><p>This was also sort of inspired by my fanzine collab with mourn3d (who's an awesome writer and person), and I have been reminded of how much I loved writing Trisha in the first place. I struggle with dysmorphia too in a huge way, and it reared its head the other day before my birthday, yay lol. It's always fun hating being stuck in the shoes you're in. I don't have someone lovely like Michael in this fic, so I'll just write it instead. Hey, why not. You can borrow him too. </p><p>Italic "they" represents the pronoun of the combined T.  Anything else is a stressed word. There's also one very awful word in here, and I wish Trevor would've ripped their balls off. Anyway.</p><p>Anyway, the song that inspired this is a fucking awesome song called Transgender Dysmorphia Blues by Against Me! and the poem Michael reads to T is by one of my favorite poets, Sylvia Plath, and called Love Letter. </p><p>Happy Valentine's Day. &lt;3 Or belated.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p><em> They </em> remembered idle summers as a child spent near the Pacific, playing down in the choppy waters near the American border, and no one paid <em> them </em> any mind as <em> they </em> buried themselves in sand and dirt up to <em> their </em> tiny waist, so really, the States had seemed to <em> their </em> young mind like an amazing place, indeed, where people were allowed to be whatever they wanted to be without ridicule, where at the end of the day, when <em> they </em> decided they had simply had enough and wanted to slide back into whatever persona <em> they </em> were comfortable using, <em> they </em> could just do that, just like putting on a jacket or shirking it off again.</p><p>It had been a soothing feeling for many years to rely on that until the time had come when <em> they </em> had been forced to endure as <em> him</em>, and he had been ordered to live across the border. It was nowhere near like he’d ever once envisioned it in his youth. </p><p>Even now, he still wasn’t used to being a whole of something again. What he had with Michael was as fragile as those memories sometimes were, and there was a certain resentment there...an impression that he could only be cherished for that one part of him, that Michael kept lifting these dresses, the lingerie, and filching the best jewelry for him while fencing goods not because there was love there but because he wanted something as close to female as he could get.</p><p>The stares followed them wherever they went. Michael pretended to be aloof, but how could one not notice the eyes burning into their backs, into their very minds, into every crevice of their hearts whispering, “You don’t belong, boy. You’re not a girl.”</p><p>He tried. He wore whatever Michael threw at him, grew his hair long, put on makeup, sought for ways to recapture <em> her</em>, and it wasn’t like she wasn’t still there within him, but he’d had to struggle so much to forget her because it wasn’t normal, he wasn’t supposed to be her in this world. If he were just gay, it was easily forgotten and hideable. If he wasn’t? Same difference.</p><p>In every jagged mirror, he was a girl with broad shoulders but no breasts. With just a modest hint of curve but nothing to round it all out. <em> Their </em> name was Trisha, and <em> they </em> adored the color purple as much as <em> they </em> loved ocean eyes and tragic love songs.</p><p>Michael came and went, went and came, came and went some more, as some guys managed to do. He was as turbulent and merciless as the waters that cast the colors of his irises, and <em> they </em> had accepted that long ago when <em> they’d </em> played in his sandy shores.</p><p>Yet here they all were again finally and reconciled at the coast of <em> their </em> Sandy Shores like out of some Hallmark movie. Michael watched <em> them </em> from beneath his shades, feigning interest in some book in his hands, but Trisha could always hone in on attentiveness from at least three hundred meters away, so <em> they </em> strolled the sands while keenly keeping a vigilant eye on <em> their </em> precarious wanderer of the last decade.</p><p>The little side of the sea they were on was unmarred by the customary visitors with their ATVs. Some of <em> their </em> associates and Maude’s friends had seen to that a few years back. Maude understood the value of having a place to be free, a place to be themselves in the sun and to bask in what they were. She had suffered her own body image issues long before and enjoyed somewhere that was far away from prying eyes so she could sunbathe nude without the outlandish comments of eye-gaping asswipes who couldn’t refrain just one day from shrieking, “Man the harpoons!”</p><p>Even <em> they </em> had heard the soft murmurs of <em> faggot </em> when <em> they’d </em> strayed too long at Binco’s around the women’s section.</p><p>Trevor was unbridled rage and lust. Trevor had demanded to pull their balls out through their mouths and then make them eat them again for breakfast.</p><p>Trisha was a deep unending sorrow and pain. Trisha hadn’t understood why everything had to end so violently and with her in ruins, but she had come to the recognition long ago that it had something to do with why Michael was pushed away. So she had slipped further and further into the recesses of <em> their </em> mind until Michael had come calling for her.</p><p>Valentine’s Day. It was always Valentine’s Day.</p><p>He always knew how to draw her forth, to drag <em> them </em> back together in all the finest ways.</p><p>Trevor hated it, preferred to protect <em> them </em> from this slimy piece of shitty snake, but she knew Michael, had known him so many times, had let him know all the best parts of her, and had refused to consider that he could ever harm her. And Trevor had been proven right so many times, of course, but she couldn’t hide from herself.</p><p><em> They </em> yearned to be hurt by this one person.</p><p>Trevor was about as romantic as barbed wire, but she was the teddy bear beneath him, pushing through, and <em> they </em> collided, feeling and filling each other in so many ways. He needed her just to have a reaction when he got off, just as she had to have him just to kill the onslaught of emotions and entomb them in the snow-covered grounds of Ludendorff where they belonged.</p><p>But there came Michael with his liquidy eyes trained on <em> them</em>, reading the silky smooth words of Sylvia Plath, and <em> they </em> searched long and hard within <em> themselves </em> to recall when <em> they’d </em> even bothered to mention to him that <em> they </em> held her poetry to the highest regard, but there he was, murmuring <b> <em>Love Letter</em> </b> with his dark honeyed Midwestern accent, and <em> God</em>, it did things to <em> them </em> that <em> they </em> couldn’t ever hope to ever undo.</p><p>“Not easy to state the change you made.” He fixated on <em>them</em>, dared to hold <em>their</em> gaze. “If I’m alive now, then I was dead, though, like a stone, unbothered by it, staying put according to habit.”</p><p><em> They </em> advanced toward him, shivering from the cold <em> they </em> could no longer feel but remember deep within <em> their </em> bones. Trevor cursed openly, although it came out as mere mumbles; Trisha whimpered as the images flooded her head, unyielding like those gales of yesteryear.</p><p><em> They </em> clashed in the middle and moved to him with aching hands that longed to touch any piece of him.</p><p>He peeked up from underneath his specs. “You didn’t just tow me an inch, no, nor leave me to set my small bald eye skyward again, without hope, of course, of apprehending blueness, or stars.” The barest hint of a smile lit his face as he peered up and down <em> their </em> body, admiring each imperfection the way a god beheld a flawed creation in its hands. “That wasn’t it. I slept, say: a snake, masked among black rocks as a black rock in the white hiatus of winter—”</p><p>“Oh, you’re a fucking snake, for sure,” Trevor laughed out but then had the good grace to look sheepishly at the ground. “Sorry…sorry, I—”</p><p>Things were always difficult between them when Trevor wanted to go running straight into brick walls. There was no finesse. Michael desired those things, needed normalcy during the times when the highs came plunging down, and Trevor didn’t know how to stop.</p><p>Trisha lurched forward like a baby deer that had been held in a pen for so long, she had forgotten how to stretch her legs. She wobbled slightly and so restlessly, not unlike those early years by the Pacific, until she glanced around her and saw…not one single person, and a smirk crept onto her face.</p><p>So many couples. So many nice, <em> normal </em> couples, everyday couples came down by the sea or fled out to the bay, had quickies when no one was peeping and drove off. All the time. Every day. <em> All the time</em>.</p><p>Couldn’t they be one?</p><p>They could never have forever. <em> They </em> would always be delegated as a side mistress. That upset <em> them</em>, probably bothered Trevor way more than it did her. It was the life. It was <em> their </em> way of life. She could never be a woman. She could never be complete, so why not just be content with this one thing? Why not just be happy with Michael and with the pieces she could take?</p><p>Trevor always craved more, more, more…he was never satisfied. Not wholly. And she was never filled perfectly. She just wished to be loved. <em> They </em> both wanted something. <em> They </em> both needed the man beneath <em> them </em> in very diverse ways. One had this desperate requirement to control him just to see what would happen because of his inane issues with breaking boundaries, and one desired to be owned <em> by </em> him just to know what it felt like to be chosen by someone.</p><p>She squirmed over Michael’s lap and leaned forward, whispering in his ear, “The way you read makes my head spin, I can’t believe you remembered—”</p><p>Two hands gripped her, and he showed her that seldom seen grin, the one that was mostly preserved for successful scores. It was harder to come by in these recent years, but when he beamed, the years broke away from his face, and Michael Townley took his place.</p><p>It stole her breath away.</p><p>“You’re still in there, Mike,” she whispered gently and let the tears fall. Everyone be damned, she was very much <em> she </em> today, and this was how she felt. So many years, so many empty years had passed since she’d been close to the awe that was this living Adonis.</p><p>He tugged her to him and then brought his palms up to her scalp, running his fingers through her hair. That was consistently a sore point for her because her hair had been long and well-kept until Trevor had…well, maybe <em> she </em> had just let him take the reins because of the misery. Everything had gloriously numbed it. Trevor had protected <em>them</em> rather well whenever <em> they </em> were suffering, after all.</p><p>“Baby, I’ve never gone anywhere. I’ve always been here. You could change my name to whatever the fuck you want, and I’m still me.”</p><p>“Why doesn’t that work for me?” she hummed to herself as she dug under the hem of his shorts and boxers, working to spring his erection free from the confining material. Licking her lips pensively, she groused onward, “No one likes Trevor because he states what’s on his mind even if it’s often the cruel truth, and he does what feels good without worry of consequences.”</p><p>“Hey, I like Trevvv—” He paused shortly with a hiss as he felt her hands slip around sensitive flesh.</p><p>She smiled as she worked her old familiar favorite friend, teasing it tenderly with her tongue. “No one likes Trisha because she is like Pinocchio from the old fables. Not real.”</p><p>He wrenched her off him, startling her, and for a minute, she swore she was about to see the Michael of old, was almost wildly anxious but desperately glad to have that piece of the past when he clutched her to him, hauling her into his lap, against his chest where she could lay her ear near the continuous rhythm of his heart there. “Don’t fuckin’ talk about yourself like that.”</p><p>Hot tears fell against his skin, coating it, and she was ashamed. Her fingers hurried to wash him, but she couldn’t erase the telltale traces of what she’d done. “We…we can’t avoid it, Mike, we can’t. I’m not…I’m not—”</p><p>He pulled her to his lips and kissed away the pain the best he knew how. “You’re real to me. You’ve always been real to me.”</p><p>They could never have forever because sometimes life didn’t work out that way. The red string of fate wasn’t connected, it arrived broken, and lives were left aimlessly looking for that other piece. <em> They </em> were one such individual, constantly searching. Michael often seemed like that soulmate but was already linked to someone else.</p><p>And he had to get back to Amanda. They only had a limited while today, on this day for lovers.</p><p>A question was caught in <em> their </em> throat, but <em> they </em> faltered, drawing lazy patterns around his nipples out of fear of an erroneous answer.</p><p>“I know what you’re thinking.”</p><p><em> Their </em> eyes didn’t move.</p><p>“I love you just as you are, T.”</p><p><em> They </em> released a breath <em> they </em> didn’t realize <em> they’d </em> been holding. “Why? Why do you when no one else <em> can? </em>”</p><p>Michael started to laugh, and it was as rich and velvety as the sweetest chocolate, coating <em> their </em> starved ears. “I don’t know? I have several people, including you, reminding me I’m a shitstain all the time, and you still love me for some reason. You’re probably the only one who gives me the least grief about it, actually,” he added thoughtfully.</p><p>Without another moment’s hesitation, Trisha removed the cloth belt from her purple summer dress and handed it over. Michael looked up at her in confusion and then leered suddenly as she tugged up on the hem of her dress, positioning him right against her entrance. “If you love…me, OK? If you love me completely, then…then you have to trust this.”</p><p>He licked his lips and seized <em> their </em> midriff, “Fuck yeah, baby, whatever you say.”</p><p><em> They </em> glided down on him, and even after all of these years, the way they connected was if they were meant to be, and that wasn’t wasted on either Trisha or Trevor…maybe not even Michael, but he chose to overlook things like that more often.</p><p>The way his eyes rolled back until only the whites could be seen was so damn exquisite, and as much as <em> they </em> both wanted to lean forward and suckle his neck, there was work to be done. “Mikey, baby,” she crooned, “you have to concentrate for this to be good.” He nodded, and she couldn’t help herself as her tongue slipped inside just for a small taste of bourbon, Redwoods, and something distinctly Michael. “We need something from you. The <em> both </em> of us do.”</p><p>“OK?”</p><p>“He wants to take control—”</p><p>As usual, anything that might hurt Michael’s poor masculinity sent him into a state of alarm. “What the fuck? No, there—there’s no way in hell that—no—-”</p><p>She pushed forward and worked to calm him down, shushed him, pecked his cheeks, and coaxed kisses onto his forehead and earlobes. “No, nothing like that.” Her fingers played with strands of hair, curling them, fingering the texture, and then smoothing them back out. If only she still had hair. Shaking her head, she closed her eyes and exhaled. “No, I need you to use <em> that </em> on me, and he needs to use his hands on you.”</p><p>The frightened look left his face and was followed by something unique that she couldn’t put a finger on, but when he squeezed her ass, and she could sense every bit of him inside, there was no halting the moans that wrested from her mouth. Then he slapped her cheeks roughly as his voice rumbled darkly, “OK, T, you sexy fuck, if that’s what you want, that’s what you’re gonna get.”</p><p>The heat rolled off <em> their </em> flushed face in waves as <em> they </em> curiously watched him create a slipknot before lifting it over <em> their </em> neck and tightening it. “M-maybe this wasn’t…I wasn’t—”</p><p>He glared at <em> them </em> harshly, blue eyes almost pools of black blazing back at <em> them </em> passionately as he jerked vigorously on the belt that was twisted around his fist several times. “Too fuckin’ late for that, don’t ya think?” He caressed <em> their </em> chest with his free hand and shouted an order, “Start bouncing that sweet ass, T, I ain’t got all day!”</p><p><em> They </em> hiccupped despite <em> themselves</em>, almost wanting to cry from how naïve and needy <em> they </em> sounded all the way to how amazingly filled <em> they </em> were, but it wasn’t finished though, not with that aching in the back of <em> their </em> head, those fingers itching to find his throat….</p><p>He picked up the pace, breathtakingly so, and pulled on the belt until <em> they </em> felt <em> their </em> world caving in around <em> them</em>. “Isn’t there something you want to do? I could’ve sworn there was something, but maybe you’re just too much of a fuckin’ pussy to reach out and grab—”</p><p>Hands wrapped around his throat and crushed ever so strongly while whispered apologies came forward with spilled tears. <em> They </em> cried. <em> They </em> wept so goddamn much. <em> They </em> loved him so goddamn much it hurt, and it was Trisha who warned <em> them </em> that it was because of the devotion <em> they </em> had for him that <em> they </em> had even learned how to trust others into <em> their </em> world in the first place, so <em> they </em> had to stop choking the delicate soul from him.</p><p>He gasped for air, and <em> they </em> didn’t dare to produce a peep. When he became totally aware again, he clasped <em> them </em> to him and made love to <em> their </em> lips with his own as if he’d never kissed in his whole life.</p><p>“Mikey…?”</p><p>“Do it again,” he muttered hotly and pounded into <em> them </em> while they both choked the life from each other in turns; both alive, then dead, and then alive again. <em> La petite mort. </em></p><p>And that’s how they fucked each other, made love to each other, joined together. All the same motion, even if different names, <em>they</em> realized. <em>They</em> no longer cared which it was called by, what <em>they</em> were called by on this misty day next to the rough waves near the coastline. <em>They</em> couldn’t choose <b><em>how</em></b> <em>they</em> were made. <em>They</em> could only choose <b><em>for whom</em></b> <em>they</em> were.</p>
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